Planes, trains and automobiles.
We have rapidly-increasing numbers of the former and the latter, but basically none of the middle mode of transport for various means here on the Island.
We all know what the heavy vehicle traffic means and that’s been discussed many times in this space and elsewhere how the infrastructure is being seriously impacted to meet the volume.
Now, what about air traffic? It’s an interesting topic that’s been gaining traction around the community lately, simply because there seems to be a lot of small aircraft, air ambulances, passenger planes, helicopters, float planes and more around the skies of the Chemainus and Cowichan Valleys.
Cowichan-Malahat-Langford MP Alistair MacGregor actually held a public forum several years ago on the subject, stemming from numerous complaints by residents about the noise and heavy concentration of planes in the air at all hours of the day and night. Perhaps it’s time for another one because there seems to be even more than a few years ago.
If nothing else, it might be worthwhile for the public to know exactly what is going on. There are more planes, especially following post-COVID limitations, of course, heading into the Victoria Airport that fly directly over our area regularly.
It would also be interesting to find out how much the use of air ambulances has increased. Are they in operation more frequently even for relatively minor incidents compared to the past, just being on site in case they’re needed? No one knows for sure.
There have been at least a half dozen incidents of air ambulances landing and flying out of Chemainus Secondary School in the last two years alone. During the previous decade to that, it might have been once.
That’s either a sign of the times with more serious crashes happening or perhaps an overuse of a resource that frequently might wind up on standby. It’s hard to say.
There was an incident just a little more than a week ago involving the transport of a driver to hospital following a rollover crash near Chemainus. The trouble is information on these incidents seldom gets released so more transparency is in order to justify the seemingly overly busy skies.